Awkward as it may be, over the past several years I've written a number of posts on the impact of my upbringing, with its emphasis on sexual purity, on my sex life both past and present. This time I want to turn to a subject I don't believe I've explored yet, and that is my adolescent "struggles" and internal conflicts over masturbation.I've written before about the huge physical response physical touch evoked in my body when I first started dating. I've written, too, that early in my sex … [Read more...]

A post about female masturbation recently appeared on Christianity Today's women's section. Christianity Today is generally more mainstream evangelical than my upbringing, so much so that I remember viewing it as somewhat liberal. This post, though, has had me questioning all of that.The basic gist is this---the author accepts that women are sexual and may turn to masturbation as an outlet for their sexual desire---something that is foreign to many evangelicals---but follows that up by … [Read more...]

Samantha Field recently wrote two posts on consent on her blog, Defeating the Dragons. She was seeking to answer a question: Why evangelical purity advocates seem unable to talk about consent except to mock it. I found her insights incredibly insightful. (And this isn't an aberration for Samantha---she's brilliant and has an incredibly moving story and you should all read her blog.)In her first post, Samantha wrote that: They don’t teach consent because teaching consent would undermine one o … [Read more...]

Good gracious, I just came upon a Babble article titled Jessa Duggar Will Have a Chaste Courtship---And My Kids Will, Too. With all due respect, author Kacy Faulconer has no idea whether or not her children will have "chaste courtships." My parents said their children would have chaste courtships too, and guess what? I didn't! Kacy can give her children whatever advice she chooses, but ultimately, once they're adults, she cannot control their choices.I talk a lot here on the blog about the … [Read more...]

Several weeks ago, I talked to my mom about Doug Phillips' affair and the closing of Vision Forum Ministries. My mom talked about how sad that was, and how bad she felt for Doug's wife and children, all of which I'd been expecting. But she didn't stop there, and I hadn't expected her to."Well," she concluded, shaking her head, "he's male."And she clearly felt that explained it. But I was not content to let that go. "Actually mom, most guys manage to not cheat on their wives," I told her. … [Read more...]

This from Doug Phillips' original "Statement of resignation": There has been serious sin in my life for which God has graciously brought me to repentance. I have confessed my sin to my wife and family, my local church, and the board of Vision Forum Ministries. I engaged in a lengthy, inappropriate relationship with a woman. While we did not “know” each other in a Biblical sense, it was nevertheless inappropriately romantic and affectionate. This from Doug Phillips' recent "Clarification on Res … [Read more...]

Fundamentalist and conservative evangelical Christianity is weird. Women are taught to dress modestly in public, to stay away from pornography or premarital sex, etc. Prostitutes and strippers are derided, along with everyone who dresses "like a whore" (i.e. less modestly than they're supposed to). But in private, within marriage? Women are expected to perform. They have to somehow go from reserved modesty to being, well, a man's personal supermodel.Take this blog comment, for instance: I … [Read more...]